那是這路途 How Could This Be That Road
唐僧道：「既有雷音之景，莫不就是靈山？你休誤了我誠心，擔擱了我來意。」行者道：「不是，不是。靈山之路，我也走過幾遍，那是這路途？」八戒道：「縱然不是，也必有個好人居住。」沙僧道：「不必多疑，此條路未免從那門首過，是不是一見可知也。」行者道：「悟淨說得有理。」唐僧道：「既有雷音之景，莫不就是灵山？你休误了我诚心，担搁了我来意。」行者道：「不是，不是。灵山之路，我也走过几遍，那是这路途？」八戒道：「纵然不是，也必有个好人居住。」沙僧道：「不必多疑，此条路未免从那门首过，是不是一见可知也。」行者道：「悟净说得有理。」
逐句解 Line by line
The Tang Monk said, "If it has the look of Thunderclap, can it not be Vulture Peak itself?"
莫不就是 is a hopeful question rather than a real one — he has already decided and is looking for agreement. Vulture Peak is named three times in the chapter, and two of the three fall within twenty-five characters of each other, both in this exchange.
"Do not spoil my sincerity or hold up the purpose I came for."
This is the sentence to watch. He recasts a warning as an obstruction — 擔擱 is the everyday word for holding somebody up, with 擔 at dān, the verb, not the dàn of a carried load — so that Pilgrim's caution becomes an attack on his sincerity. It is the same move he made about the height of the mountain, and he will make it once more.
Pilgrim said, "It is not. It is not."
Four characters of speech behind a three-character attribution, and the doubling is flat refusal rather than emphasis. Everything he has to offer follows in the next sentence.
"I have gone the road to Vulture Peak several times myself. How could this be that road?"
The strongest thing said in the whole argument, and nobody answers it. 那 reads nǎ, the interrogative standing in for 哪, so the question is rhetorical and expects the answer it could not. He has walked the road to Vulture Peak; this is not it.
Eight Rules said, "Even if it is not, there must be good people living there."
Eight Rules is thinking about dinner, and the reasoning is his usual sort: a building implies householders and householders imply hospitality. 好人 here means well-disposed rather than virtuous.
Sha Monk said, "No need for all this doubting. The road cannot help passing that gateway, and one look will tell us whether it is or not."
The longest single speech in the argument, and the one that ends it — as his joke about Eight Rules ended the earlier exchange on the mountain. 未免 is not a hedge here but a statement of necessity: the road goes past that gateway whether anybody likes it or not.
Pilgrim said, "Wujing speaks sense."
Nine characters, carrying their own attribution and closing their own quotation, so the unit stands alone however short. 得 is de, the little link between the verb and what follows it, rather than the dé that heads a claim of its own.
Four speakers, four kinds of argument, and the weakest one carries the day. Tripitaka argues from resemblance, Pilgrim from experience, Eight Rules from appetite, and Sha Monk from the shape of the road — and what settles it is Sha Monk's observation that they have to walk past the gate in any case.
Which is a real answer to Eight Rules and no answer at all to Pilgrim, who never objected to passing the gate. He objected to going in. The party agrees to something nobody actually proposed, and that is how the chapter contrives to get all four of them inside a building only one of them wanted to enter.
Tripitaka's line about not spoiling his sincerity is worth marking down. He has turned a warning into an obstacle to his own devotion, so that refusing to go in would be a failure of faith rather than an act of sense. The novel lets him do it here, and lets him do it once more a few passages on, when he answers the last warning with a vow.